


Devotion

by coveredinfeels



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: M/M, Tal-Vashoth feels, fluff?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-26
Updated: 2015-11-26
Packaged: 2018-05-03 13:12:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5292137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coveredinfeels/pseuds/coveredinfeels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(noun)</p>
<p>1. Ardent, often selfless affection and dedication, as to a person or principle.<br/>2. An act of religious observance or prayer, especially when private.<br/>3. The act of devoting or the state of being devoted</p>
<p>(with apologies to American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Devotion

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to June for the fic sprint that finally got me to finish this!

His door is unlocked.

For a moment, he thinks it might be more assassins, out of pattern though that would be, but after a moment more consideration, dismisses the thought. There's been nothing else to suggest infiltration, and leaving the door unlocked would be beyond stupid if someone actually wanted to catch him unawares. Might work as a double-bluff, but that's more effort than would likely be spent on removing one singular Tal-Vashoth.

Also, Dorian's usual seat at the Herald's Rest has been empty for the past hour.

"You're picking my locks, now?" he says, as he enters. 

Dorian is lounging on the corner chair, obviously posing, too carefully casual. He's loosened the buckles on his clothing in the way he does when he'd like Bull to undress him but doesn't want to risk any actual damage to the outfit. "As I've tried to explain to the Inquisitor many times, manipulating the primordial energies of the Fade is not as simple as wiggling your fingers at a lock and yelling OPEN at it."

"You got Sera to do it."

"I got Sera to do it." Dorian agrees, leaning forward. "You know, even in Tevinter it is considered impolite to break an affair off without actually informing the other party as to _why_."

Ah. Bull considers how much he can explain without explaining. His demons are weighty things, not something to impose on one who struggles enough with his own. "I just need to work through some things."

"And this involves your open-door policy turning into a locked-door-and-ignoring-me policy how?" Dorian stands. "I don't expect-- I mean, I hardly expected some sort of commitment."

He spits the last word like it's bitter on his tongue, and it doesn't fool Bull for a second. But the thought bubbles up, from beneath that false bitterness, and ah, that could work. If it's what Dorian needs. The Inquisition, and the Inquisitor, can provide ample structure for him out in the field, where the world is simple and without doubt, but in the quiet spaces between, where there's nothing to fight, once he's seen that his boys have eaten and drunk their fill and gone to their beds, or someone's bed, at least--

He can be what Dorian needs. Maybe if he does that, he won't become anything else. "Is that what you need?"

Dorian freezes for a moment. “Don't.” he says, even as the lines of his body strain towards Bull as if drawn by some invisible force. “Don't tempt me with things you don't mean, Bull. This isn't like asking if I'd fancy being tied to your bed.”

“I could buy you dinner first.” Bull suggests, which does at least make Dorian's lips turn up a moment, at the shared memory. “Don't exactly have much experience with that side of things.”

“Well, thank goodness you have me, with my great and storied experience with romantic entanglements.” His tone is sharp, but Bull fancies he hears something soft and wanting underlying the word _romantic_. “And how lucky for me, that you are willing to indulge my foolishness.”

Certainly not at all like asking Dorian if he'd like to be tied to the bed, which had been an easy question timed such that he could hardly deny it, hands pinned above his head, squirming in the way that said he really just wanted to feel Bull press him down harder. Sex, for all that people make it complicated, is simple. He still remembers the old Tamassran who taught him that. You can make rules for it, follow them. Questions and answers. Words that slow, pause, stop.

He knows what Dorian needs to hear, and he knows that if he was to use Dorian's words for it they would be lies, and he's not Hissrad any more. There is something, that he can offer, that might be something like the same, but the words curdle in his throat. He feels like a trainee again, stumbling over his words.

But Ben-Hassrath trainers were willing to provide correction, again and again, right phrasing, right nuance, right tone and pace, the right mask to inhabit for the right job for what the Qun would require of him.

The Qun requires nothing of him now, and if he gets these words wrong, Dorian might walk away. “ _I_ need to be what other people need me to be.”

“Other people.” Dorian says, turning his nose up. He does not look to be impressed. “I am sure you can find any number of scullery maids to assist you in that.”

“I could.” He agrees. “I just don't want to. Don't know why. Maybe it's because you're so damn pretty when I'm indulging you.”

Dorian makes one of the thoughtful noises he likes to make when he's already decided something but is drawing the process out. “So, an arrangement of mutual benefit, then.”

Oh, he chooses his words as carefully as Bull does. “'Mutual benefit'? That's cold, Dorian.” Still afraid to show his fire, his warmth; still uncertain if it's time to tip his hand. To be fair, Bull's not sure, either.

“Your _room_ is cold, is what's cold.” Dorian snaps, with a smile that says he's seen the opening and is quite delighted by it. “You should come here and warm me up.”

Emotions swell, sharp, unfamiliar. But Dorian, just by coming here, has drawn the lines. It proves easier than Bull thought to fill the spaces in between.

To look him in the eye, to speak his name, to acknowledge him as separate from any other. To praise the beauty he flaunts and fears to be scorned for. To kiss, to touch, in those places too intimate for a casual fuck, too sexual for anyone but a lover. To murmur promises in Dorian's ear and believe them.

They don't go three times, and nothing gets set on fire, but when Dorian slips out of bed afterwards, it's only to lock the door.

* * *

Tal-Vashoth go mad without the Qun. Because they have no structure, no purpose, nothing to devote themselves to other than themselves.

The Iron Bull might not understand love, but he knows devotion. Moment by moment, breath by breath, kiss by kiss-- to devote himself to Dorian's pleasure, to chasing away the old shame, to the way Dorian smiles, tucked into his side, forgetting to complain of sweat and stink and how far it is to the baths. “So what is this, then, if you don't like 'arrangement'?”

Good question. He can only give an honest answer. “I don't know. It's something, that's for sure.”

Dorian laughs. “ _Something_. I suppose I can work with 'something'.”


End file.
